As a follow up to my post last week about purpose, values, vision and mission, it seems appropriate to communicate the purpose and values of the Center for Church Communication (CFCC), the nonprofit behind Church Marketing Sucks (CMS) and a handful of other projects both happening and in the hopper.
I’ll break this into two different posts, and follow today’s “purpose” post with a post later this week about our values.
History
First, a brief explanation of CFCC and its role in Church Marketing Sucks and sister projects. CFCC and CMS started in 2004. The original idea behind CFCC was to provide communication and marketing services to churches. CMS started as a conversation for the community of communicators to learn and grow together as we frustrate, educate and motivate the church to communicate, with uncompromising clarity, the truth of Jesus Christ. Although CFCC and CMS were birthed at the same time by the same group of people (under my meager leadership), they were separate ideas powered by different teams without any relationship to each other (to avoid any potential or perceived conflicts of interest). It didn’t take long for CFCC to abandon its original model (mission), and instead come alongside and be the over-arching organization for CMS, the Church Marketing Lab, and other projects being hatched. In 2005, CFCC was incorporated as a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization.
CFCC is not meant to be a household name or mega brand. Instead, it provides the behind-the-scenes platform for a variety of projects and experiments that all work in concert to help church communities communicate better. God has been bringing together some amazing people and possibilities, and I look forward to sharing them with you in due time. More about the vision and mission of CFCC in a future post, including where we’re going and how we’re getting there.
Purpose of Center for Church Communication
The purpose of CFCC is to help the church matter. The church has the greatest story ever told, but in general, we don’t know how to tell it very well. That’s a communication problem. The remarkable gospel story is lost thanks in part to poor research, little or no planning and methods that compete with culture more than they create culture.
We believe there’s a better way. It’s not simply flashy designs or catchy slogans, but effective and authentic communication. If we can’t communicate, how can we fulfill the great commission? We want the Church to matter. We want your church to matter.
This purpose—to help the church matter—drives everything we do.
As you can see, it’s not specific, it doesn’t tell you how we do it, when we do it, or where we do it. It just says why we do it. Next, I’ll share the values of CFCC, and what guides our decisions and informs our vision and mission.
